THRILLS

Wednesday December 6 Down memoir lane: Two memoirs that couldn’t be more different will receive attention tonight at the two Tattered Cover bookstores. In the Cherry Creek mothership, 2955 E. 1st Ave., things will be all glitz and flashbulbs when actress Loni Anderson tells all–she’ll autograph copies of My Life…

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Wednesday November 29 At your bidding: It’s a small service, but one that brings great joy into the lives of AIDS patients for whom pets provide a sense of well-being and belonging. Members of the organization PAWS (Pets Are Wonderful Support) help provide supplies and assistance in caring for those…

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Wednesday November 22 Shane, Shane: Once the sloppy, sotted, folk-punk heart of Ireland’s Pogues, Shane MacGowan is back–in all his crooked-toothed splendor–with the newly configured Popes. The son of an office worker and a famed traditional Irish singer, well-read, off-key and off-color, late-season pub rocker MacGowan was transformed at his…

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Wednesday November 15 Lost in space: A real-life adventure and some of America’s favorite manufactured ones will be spotlighted tonight at separate Tattered Cover book signings, one at each T.C. location: U.S. Air Force Captain Scott O’Grady, the very same fellow who survived a fall from 27,000 feet and subsisted…

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Wednesday November 8 Two’s a crowd: As the dust continues to swirl around Amendment 2 and its impact on both sides of the fence, the issue of gay rights continues to occupy the state’s collective mind. Inner Journeys, Public Stands, a locally produced documentary, pays homage to a number of…

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Wednesday November 1 Look at me, ma: The school pageant grows up, beginning tonight at the Auraria campus, where the student-developed Kindness and Its Many Opposites: A Mosaic of Poems, Stories, Music and Drama opens at 8. Called a performance “collage” by CU-Denver theater professor Brad Bowles, the ensemble work…

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Wednesday October 25 Tan parlor: The tearjerkers don’t get any better than those written by Amy Tan, whose Chinese mother-daughter paean The Joy Luck Club was made into the rare women’s movie that spills right over into being a people’s movie. The same combination of clannish ties, humor, poignancy and…

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Wednesday October 18 The big Chile: Chile encompasses Andean heights, prairie-like pampas, the still-wild bottom of the world at Tierra del Fuego and the cultural mysteries of Easter Island–all co-existing within the lean South American nation’s boundaries. Interpreting this kind of diversity is a major task for members of Ballet…

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Wednesday October 11 Things to do in Denver before you’re dead: Denver’s annual fifteen minutes–or in this case, ten days–of Hollywood glamour and glitz begin today, when the Denver International Film Festival kicks off with a big premiere. In what is getting to be a tradition for the fest, it’s…

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Wednesday October 4 Powell to the people: Harlem-born to Jamaican parents, Colin Powell joined the army, eventually rising to the rank of four-star general. His mastermind role during Operation Desert Storm catapulted him into the public eye; now his possible presidential candidacy is discussed in a tone well above a…

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Wednesday September 27 On their toes: Twenty-five years old and still growing, one of Denver’s most respected cultural institutions celebrates in high style. Cleo Parker Robinson Dance is throwing a week of silver-anniversary events that touch on every aspect of dance: Tonight at 6:30 at the Warwick Hotel, 1776 Grant…

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Wednesday September 20 A brand-new bag: Few men have the distinction of having worked with two of the most influential funkmeisters of all time, James Brown and George Clinton. Saxman Maceo Parker not only has it, but he wears it well. The oft-sampled Parker, who’s also provided propulsive riffs behind…

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Wednesday September 13 The rite stuff: We all go through changes–author and journalist Gail Sheehy proved that long ago with her book Passages, which chronicles adult life stages. But it doesn’t take into account that we all experience those changes differently–and at different times. Her latest, New Passages: Mapping Your…

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Wednesday September 6 Ain’t had enough fun: This kind of longevity, for a rock band, is no little feat: True to its name, Little Feat has been mastering chunky, infectious rhythms since the early ’70s, despite the 1979 loss of original guiding light Lowell George, whose stunning slidework and droll…

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Wednesday August 30 Now and Zen: “I am a synthetic pessimist, not the real thing.” So writes author, traveler and martial arts enthusiast Mark Salzman in his wry, pot-drenched, coming-of-age memoir Lost in Place: Growing Up Absurd in Suburbia. Salzman, whose book is written in the droll tradition of autobiographers…

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Wednesday August 23 Someday your prints will come: The Denver Public Library’s new Central Library isn’t finished yet, although you can go there to check out a book. But little by little, the witty structure, already brimming with character, is gaining a bit more–as is its excellent, if staid, Western…

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Wednesday August 16 Burke’s lawman: Like Dave Robicheaux, the fictional Cajun detective he created, Edgar Award winner James Lee Burke has an exacting eye for detail. And eight novels into the Robicheaux series, Burke continues to use his gift to not only plot another mystery, but also to conjure time,…

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Wednesday August 9 Listen and learn: Jazz and Japan are the culturally diverse subjects at two separate lecture series in the area. The Chautauqua Forum Series ends its season at 8 tonight with a time-honored tradition–a concert lecture given annually by Willie Hill, University of Colorado College of Music professor…

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Wednesday August 2 Foo’s paradise: Not one to dwell on past events, ex-Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl surged forward after Kurt Cobain’s suicide with his own band, Foo Fighters, thrashing around old and new musical ideas with a do-it-yourself confidence not generally expected of a man firmly ensconced behind his traps…

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Wednesday July 26 Moonlight serenade: Get out your shoulder pads, girls–Larimer Square will be transformed this evening into a wartime dancehall, with help from the still-rollicking Glenn Miller Big Band Orchestra. Although bandleader Miller perished more than fifty years ago, his spirit continues to jitterbug into the Nineties as the…

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Wednesday July 19 Take a bike: In just a few short years, Denver Bike Week has been expanded to Denver Bike Month, offering fun incentives to cyclists throughout July. But the event’s centerpiece is still today’s Bike to Work Day, when all you suits can pedal downtown, grab a free…

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Wednesday July 12 Designing children: The Denver Department of Parks and Recreation wants the city’s junior swingers to come out and tell it how to build a new playground at Gates Crescent Park, adjacent to the Children’s Museum along the Platte River Greenway. Kids ages five to twelve and their…